Editors Note:
When Recovering Grace was founded with the purpose of helping those who were struggling under the weight of the burden of legalism and performance theology, we had little idea of how far reaching our ministry would be, or whom God would bring to us along the way. We have been grateful for the many who have volunteered their stories and wisdom to our readers.
The majority of our posts and blog comments have been by former students of ATI, Bill Gothard’s Advanced Training Institute, which he launched in the early 1980’s. One author and prolific commenter is an individual known to our community as “Wendy B.” Part of Wendy’s “recovery” centered on the Greatest Commandment found in Luke 10:27, which simply states that we are to “Love the Lord with all your heart, mind, and soul; and to love your neighbor as yourself”. She summed this up in an article that was originally published on September 19, 2011. We are rerunning it today because it is worth repeating, and to honor Wendy, as she recently lost a lengthy battle with cancer.
Bill Gothard would often suggest in his materials, counseling and other conversations that tragic events such as miscarriage and illnesses such as cancer were a direct judgment from God on an individual due to sin or character defect in their life. This is not a new teaching, and in fact was a teaching of the Pharisees in Jesus’ day. It’s important to note that Jesus rebuked this in Luke 13:1-5. While we don’t understand why a Godly wife and mother like Wendy would be taken from her family prematurely, we trust that God’s timing is perfect. We know that Wendy’s grieving family and friends can look forward to a day when “God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.” Revelation 21:4 (KJV)
As I am going through this process of recognizing and healing from the effects of growing up with IBLP/ATI, I find that daily life can often draw parallels to what I am feeling internally. I was washing a window in my kitchen today and realized that one of them is broken. It is pointless to clean it because if I wanted people to think of me as a good housekeeper then I should just replace it, right? Yet, I continue to clean it until we have the time to replace it.
In ATI we had all the cleaning supplies. We were promised that we had the power and the desire (Bill Gothard’s definition of grace) to clean up our lives. If we didn’t have our lives clean then we were simply resisting God’s grace. We were promised many different successes if we applied all of the rules. Such as, if we committed to courtship our marriages would be a success and we would remain pure emotionally and physically. If we dumped all of our rock music then we would be clean and free from that horrible addiction allowing the light of our eyes to shine. We learned that by memorizing and meditating on Scriptures we would find God’s purpose for our lives. This would bring us our Life Purpose enabling us to make wise decisions. We longed for the day, as did our parents, when we would be so clean we could look like all those perfect young people that Bill Gothard paraded across the Knoxville stage. The list was endless–memorize more, memorize the right verses (Song of Solomon is out), memorize the 49 character qualities and their definitions. Display these in your life (especially “gratefulness”), meditate on the verses, wake up earlier, wake up in the middle of the night, serve more, have a better attitude, have a testimony (written in four parts), have perfect clothes, perfect hair, etc. The list continues as you “stay under the protection of your parents authority” because they have things we must follow too.
There was one problem–we were all broken! We didn’t like the blue neckties, we had crushes on boys, and we craved music that moved us. We were never memorizing enough Scripture or remembering to meditate on verses. We were too busy doing Wisdom Booklets and our Journals of Faith or washing the dishes. We fell asleep during Wisdom Searches or couldn’t find a Scripture that gave us a Rhema. When we found an obvious verse that disagreed with some of the teachings of Mr. Gothard we were dishonoring to our parents by questioning their choices in our lives. We loved clothes that made us feel pretty and found that we were immodest because they didn’t hang lifeless on us.
But more important than all these things–our brokenness was that we could not be good enough to get God’s approval. Even when we were at our best, serving at a Training Center, wearing approved clothes, keeping our eyes from looking at those of the opposite gender, we were failing. At what, we did not know, but surely someone would find out what it was. The guilt and continuous struggle were staggering. Since we had learned in the Wisdom Booklets that grinding our teeth was a sign of deeper rooted problems, we wouldn’t let anyone know. This could mean we had a problem with our servant spirit and an attitude towards our authority.
Because the truth is ". . . all our righteousness are as filthy rags." He loves us because He made us. He made us perfect through forgiveness through Jesus and not through any efforts of our own. He only asks us to have faith in His salvation.
We all said that we were saved through faith alone and yet all the rules pointed to gaining God’s approval through our own efforts. If what Jesus did wasn’t enough for us, then nothing ever will be enough. And we will be chasing rules forever. That is no way to live life!
Jesus said that the whole of the law was to love the Lord with all your heart, mind, and soul; and to love your neighbor as yourself. Love is the opposite of rules. When we live our lives as an outpouring of love, we end up pleasing God. But when we live a life of following the rules, we end up living opposite of love. Instead, we become consumed with being perfect, leading to frustration and shame. We judge others for not following the “lists” as we do or are jealous of those who seem to follow more closely than us.
The problem: We need to stop cleaning the broken glass. When Jesus died on the cross, He did it so we could be made perfect in God’s eyes. When we believe that all our sins were on His shoulders and that He died to take that punishment from us, then we can see that His whole life was one of love for us.
The solution: Living love!!! When I focus on loving you, I take my eyes off of myself and my silly rules and put them on meeting your needs. As a mom, I know what it means to sacrifice myself for someone else because you love them more than anything. That is what God did for us in a much more extreme way. When I get out of my own way, stop focusing on my shallow rules, and love others, then I am being that beautiful, sparkly replaced window that He made me when I accepted Him as my Savior!!!
Wendy leaves behind a loving husband and three children, and will be deeply missed by her family and the many friends and acquaintances she touched with her love and encouragement, even during her illness.
July 31, 2024
Rest in peace, Wendy. You will be greatly missed.
God bless you sweet Wendy. You will be missed. Hugs to your family.
Thank you Wendy.
Miss you Windy. I told you some time ago (after reading your awesome comments) that when I got rich, I wanted to hire you to write for me. Love to your family.
May God comfort her family at this time.
I already miss you, Wendy. I never even met you, but you inspire me. I will forever be in awe of how hard you fought to be a mom for your kids. You did so many painful things over and over and over with the hope that you could just be a mom for a little longer. I hope your kids always know how lucky they are to have a mom who loved them and fought so long and hard for them. I'm so glad that you have no more pain and no more tears and no more sadness. I love you, friend.
Thanks Wendy for your words. Condolences to Wendy's family. I know how it is to lose a spouse. For a sec there I thought it was the other Wendy who I consider an IBLP soldier for actually standing up to BG. But in light of this loss, may your life be celebrated and continued blessings.
1Cor 13:12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known.
Wendy B, although you are terribly missed I can't help but think of how you are face to face with Love and Joy Everlasting.
To Wendy's family, I will continue to remember you in prayer. I know our Heavenly Father is holding you close.
Wendy was someone who clearly cared about people and she cared about the truth. She was for real, a genuine person. I wish I could have met her in real life, not just online.
To Wendy's family - there are more people than you will ever meet who came to know Wendy in some small way through these online interactions, who think of her as a beautiful warrior, and who feel her loss. I groan right now for our future eternity where there will be no more tears, no more loss.
For me, this was one of the most lucid explanations of the weight borne by the IBLP/ATI students and employees due to the twisting of scripture they were constantly immersed in. I'm so very thankful Wendy found real peace and joy and love and acceptance with her heavenly Father before going to live in His presence forevermore. Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His godly ones. Whom the Lord sanctified He also justified and has now glorified. May He grant abundant comfort to her family awaiting their reunion with her in eternity, where she shares in the glory of our Savior.
May the Lord bless your family. Kinda puts things in perspective ...
Rest in peace Wendy. God bless you. I have really enjoyed reading your contributions to RG. You have a loving heart and I appreciate that you cared so much about others that you were willing to share your personal experiences, that they might avoid the dangers of IBLP.
My deepest condolences to Wendy's family.